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When a nation goes into economic crisis the paradigm
to which its people have become accustomed begins to deteriorate. Access to critical
supplies becomes difficult, sometimes immediately. In the case of Greece,
which has been dealing with a loss of confidence in its debt instruments and
economic policy, the collapse of life as Greeks know it has taken place over
the last several years.

While we have been fortunate enough to avoid as
severe a calamity here in the United States, many of the forecasts put forth
by ourselves and others regarding the effects of an
economic collapse are already taking place in Europe, namely Greece. In the
midst of the Greek panic in 2010, for example, as Greece’s meltdown was
in full swing and the people scrambled to get out of paper currencies, the
price of gold, which was trading for around $1100 an ounce in the global
commodity exchange marketplace, soared to
over $1700 an ounce on the streets of Greece. In recent months, as Greece implements
austerity measures and the unemployment rate sky rockets, its people have
lost the ability to engage in traditional commerce because, simply put, they
have no tangible income or money to do so. As a result, we’ve begun
seeing a barter
society emerge all over the country, making it possible for some people to directly
exchange labor for consumptive goods and service.

When things get bad – and they will –
the most essential items necessary for survival will disappear first. As
currencies collapse, financial market destabilize and economies come to a
standstill, critical supplies like food and medicine will become difficult
to acquire at any price. This is exactly what is now taking place in
Greece, where access to life-saving drugs and even common over-the-counter
medicines like aspirin is becoming a tragedy where the losses will be
measured not in Dollars or Euros, but lives.

For patients and pharmacists in financially stricken
Greece, even finding aspirin has turned into a headache.

Mina Mavrou, who runs a
pharmacy in a middle-class Athens suburb, spends hours each day pleading with
drugmakers, wholesalers and colleagues to hunt down
medicines for clients. Life-saving drugs such as Sanofi
(SAN)’s blood-thinner Clexane and
GlaxoSmithKline Plc (GSK)’s asthma inhaler Flixotide often appear as lines of crimson data on
pharmacists’ computer screens, meaning the products aren’t in
stock or that pharmacists can’t order as many units as they need.

“When we see red, we want to cry,” Mavrou said. “The situation is worsening day by
day.”

The 12,000 pharmacies that dot almost every street
corner in Greek cities are the damaged capillaries of a complex system for
getting treatment to patients. The Panhellenic
Association of Pharmacists reports shortages of almost half the
country’s 500 most-used medicines.

…

“It would be unrealistic to deny that there
are many difficulties regarding all public services due to the financial
crisis,” NicolaosPolyzos,
secretary general of the Ministry of Health, wrote in a response to
McKee’s article posted on the ministry’s website.

The reasons for the shortages are complex. One
major cause is the Greek government, which sets prices for medicines. As
part of an effort to cut its own costs, Greece has mandated lower drug prices
in the past year. That has fed a secondary market, drug manufacturers
contend, as wholesalers sell their shipments outside the country at higher
prices than they can get within Greece.

Strained government finances only make matters
worse. Wholesalers and pharmacists say the system suffers from a lack of
liquidity, as public insurers delay payments to pharmacies, which in turn
can’t pay suppliers on time.

This is what happens when a country’s economy
falls apart. In a report from 2010, economist John Williams warned that a
hyperinflationary environment in the US would not only cause food
disruptions, but also disrupt the
regular flow of commerce. And, while Greece may not specifically be experiencing a
hyperinflationary environment (yet), an economic collapse resulting from a
debt crisis has similar consequences as evidenced above.

But such a thing couldn’t happen in the United
States, right? As we approach yet another debt ceiling this month, requiring
some $1 trillion dollars just to keep the system from seizing up like an
engine that has run out of oil, our elected officials and leading economic
decision makers will ensure we avoid such an outcome.

Or will they?

How willing are you to trust the health of your
family to the very individuals and corporations who are responsible for
causing the crisis in the first place?

Like Greece, we will see a continued deterioration
of basic services here at home. We may be able to print trillions upon
trillions of dollars, but eventually those dollars will become worthless and
no one will accept them as a trusted currency. This means that all of the
food we import from other countries, the drugs we buy from pharmaceutical
companies, and the oil we buy from the middle east, will become difficult, if
not impossible, to acquire.

Now is the time to get prepared. Food, of course, is
one of the first essential preparedness items to stockpile. But how many have
given thought to life saving medications? If you have someone with a medical
condition in your family, how will you gain access to that medicine when
it’s no longer available at your local pharmacy.
We recommend taking steps immediately to secure at least a 3 – 6 month
supply of the drugs you or your family members need to survive (and to
consider proper off-grid storage methods for those requiring refrigeration).
Additionally, we strongly encourage you to consider adding Antibiotics
for SHTF Planning to your stockpiles, because if things get so bad that you are unable
to find medicines like penicillin or cipro at a
local pharmacy, you can be assured that no one on the street will be willing
to sell them – at any price.